


lose on losing dogs

by phcbosz



Category: The Walking Dead & Related Fandoms, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Accidental Voyeurism, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Anxiety, Bottom Negan (Walking Dead), Depression, Jealousy, Minor Violence, Misunderstandings, Multi, Negan (Walking Dead) Being an Asshole, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Child Abuse, Recreational Drug Use, Rough Sex, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm, Slow To Update, Smoking, Smut, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, Unreliable Narrator, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2019-10-18 05:58:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,058
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17575154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phcbosz/pseuds/phcbosz
Summary: Negan and Rick, they both need to hurt, just in different ways. They are meant to be, in the same way a cigarette and a match are, with how they burn each other out until there is nothing left but ashes.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this was supposed to be a one-shot but now it's getting too long lmao. mind the tags!!

Negan enters Rick’s world like a car crash, in the same way that you never expect it and it’s never good, and it’s so ugly but you can’t look away.

My partner, is the way Michonne introduces him, as Negan smirks with his tongue peeking out between his teeth, one arm lazily slung over Michonne’s shoulders in a silent claim. Rick’s face burns with anger and jealousy and shame. He knows he has no business feeling those emotions, but he feels them all the same.

Negan is handsome, in a way that you feel like if you look at him for too long you will burst into flames. Rick is surrounded by attractive people all the time—for some reason, all his friends are ridiculously good looking. But the difference with Negan is that Rick can’t just shrug it off and forget about it.

He can’t look away.

Negan is like a car crash, crashing into Rick’s life and destroying everything. Negan is like a tornado. Dynamite. Rick is on fight or flight mode, his heart beating out of his chest every time he steals a look only to almost be caught. It’s such a taboo, so wrong—two days ago, he was asking Michonne out, and how he is ogling her partner.

And that is an entirely different subject. He asked Michonne out, she said no, told Rick she is a lesbian, and now she is here, sitting on a guy’s lap, sending looks at Rick’s direction every few minutes as if she is giving a message.

Rick finds it incredibly cruel. He feels like he doesn’t belong in their friend group because Negan is making everyone laugh even though he is an asshole, even though he keeps flirting with everyone he comes across like Michonne doesn’t even exist, and Rick feels too big inside his skin, too small in the room.

He knows he has no right to be jealous, but maybe he is entitled to be hurt. He is hurt because Michonne thought she had to make up a lie about being a lesbian because of course, Rick wouldn’t just accept a simple ‘no’, of course, Rick is an asshole like that. He is hurt that Michonne invited him here, promised it was only a small group of their friends, because Rick doesn’t like crowds, but Rick showed up here to at least three people he doesn’t know at all, and more people than he wants for it to be easy to breathe.

He is hurt that Michonne feels the need to torture him like this, that she thinks it necessary.

Negan, it seems, takes a sick kind of amusement out of this whole thing. It’s just icing on the cake.

By the dirty and smug looks Negan keeps sending his way, he doesn’t doubt Michonne told Negan about Rick’s little crush. It’s embarrassing and humiliating. It’s childish. Rick feels like a child being punished.

Michonne, at least, seems a little sheepish about Negan’s actions, always looking… Looking something, when Negan flirts with people, when he leans too close to their space, more than enough to make them uncomfortable, when the man won’t stop teasing…

Michonne looks kind of angry, kind of not, kind of something, kind of everything. Rick wants to drown in the woman’s eyes, he wants to disappear under the waves, but he has no right, he never did.

This is Michonne’s way of proving that to him once again, and maybe it’s working perfectly, because now Rick feels even guiltily making eye contact. Maybe that’s what Michonne is looking for. Good thing Rick is always so good at feeling bad for everything and anything he does, good thing he is always so ready to bury himself six feet underground from shame.

It does get a bit too much, when Negan and Michonne start kissing, when Negan pushes her towards the wall, right in front of Rick, and his hands find their way under Michonne’s shirt.

Michonne pushes him away, harshly, enough to make Negan stumble, and Rick can’t hear anything over the loud music, all the lights flashing in his eyes makes it hard to see, but he can make out Negan laughing, body bending in a way that seems mean, even from a distance.

He can’t hear but he can guess, Negan laughs free and uncontained, like everything he does in life, probably. The man laughs and laughs, before he turns to make direct eye contact with Rick, and the distance between them seems smaller, then. Like Negan is right in front of Rick. Michonne, is no longer there.

There is only Negan wiping the blood off his lips with a sick smile, and it’s all sick, some game of manipulation that Rick wants no part of, and Rick is about to be sick. He can smell blood, even though he knows he technically can’t.

He wants to do something, anything, to intervene. Negan has no right—no right, to be treating Michonne like that. Even though Rick knows Michonne can hold his own, Rick feels incredibly scared for his friend.

Negan seems bigger, like he doesn’t fit inside the club, at that moment. So big next to Michonne’s small body—

Negan finally looks away when Michonne pushes him harshly again, making him stumble, almost fall, and it makes Rick’s heart pump faster with a sick satisfaction.

And then it’s gone, everything is gone, in the way Michonne grips Negan’s wrist tightly, pulling him towards the bathrooms. There is a haste in their step, a desperate need to get away, and of course Rick can’t look away, because it is a car crash, because it is a car crashing right into him, the way Negan cranes his head back to throw a dirty wink, before they disappear from the scene like they were never there.

But Rick can see, inside his mind, clear as glass, the image of Negan kissing Michonne, so passionate and so desperate, hands traveling the oceans across Michonne’s skin, his hands raising goosebumps where they have no right to be touching.

He leaves early, before Negan and Michonne can come back. It’s a kind of running away that sticks with you, for a while. It sticks with Rick the whole night, and then some. Sleep is not easy, it has never been, and that night, as Rick lays awake, glued to the back of his eyelids is Negan and Michonne in a bathroom stall.

He tries not to blink, then. He cries with his eyes wide open.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so i changed the fics name bc 'to be a human being' was just smth i came up w and i was like. sounds good enough! bc i was late for my bus or whatever. so now, its more meaningful,,, ig.
> 
> also nothing happens in this chapter and i already hate this fic 😎😉

“I’m sorry about Negan,” Michonne says, like she’s saying, ‘I’m sorry for your loss’. Rick thinks that might be appropriate, anyway. He feels like he lost Michonne.

It has nothing to do with how she won’t sleep with him. Of course not. It’s about how this is the first-time meeting in three weeks. Ever since… everything, Michonne has been avoiding him like he is the plague. Rick just wishes he knew what he did wrong, so maybe he could make it better.

It’s easy to be mad at Negan, easier to hate him. If Rick can hate Negan, then he doesn’t have to hate Michonne. He doesn’t want to hate Michonne.

“It’s okay,” Rick replies, and then, because he is pathetic, “So, you’ve been keeping busy?”

Michonne looks away, focusing on everything else inside the little café, and it’s a small space, not much to look at, but it seems that anything, even the wall, is more bearable to look at than Rick. Inside Rick’s mind, he thinks, maybe, he shouldn’t have come at all.

“I’m sorry, Rick.” With a sullen tone. It feels strangely like a break-up, the whole act they are putting on, the stage oh-so-beautifully decorated just for Michonne to rip Rick’s heart out and stomp on it. Rick wants nothing more than to put his hand against Michonne’s mouth, press tightly so no sound escapes.

He doesn’t want to hear what the woman has to say the next, he doesn’t want to know, he doesn’t care—he just wants to close his eyes and pretend everything is alright.

It was always so simple, so easy, and it was always so perfect, before Rick opened up to Michonne. It was always so good, so amazing, and sometimes, Michonne would lean her head on his shoulder, she would give him a kiss on the cheek, she would laugh loudly at one of his dry jokes, and everything would be lighter then, and Rick could pretend, once he went home and when it was safe to press his head against his pillow and squeal, that Michonne loved him as he loved her. That she held feelings for him, similar to the feelings Rick always hid behind his chest and under his heart.

Now, Michonne is about to speak and destroy everything, and Rick doesn’t want it, he wants to hold onto his sick fantasy that has been crumbling for the past month, he wants to do anything but be there. He wishes he could bury himself under the ground, stuff his ears full of dirt, stuff Michonne’s mouth full of dirt, so they don’t have to speak, and he doesn’t have to hear, and they can just pretend.

Rick wants nothing more than to go back. He would never tell Michonne those dreadful words, she would never hurt him like this, and Rick could have his dreams.

Not, it’s all falling apart, it’s all falling out, out of Michonne’s mouth, and she speaks: “I didn’t mean to avoid you.”

Rick snorts, with surprise and disbelief. That is not what he was expecting, for sure. He doesn’t believe it. Not when everything is pointing at something else, no matter how genuine Michonne looks.

“Really?” He asks. He doesn’t mean for it to sound that pathetic. He is going for amused. It doesn’t quite work that way.

Michonne is looking at her mug, then. Tracing the rim with one perfectly manicured nail, long pretty fingers, and red nail polish. The woman just won’t look at him, and Rick wonders what it is about his face that must be so dreadful.

“I thought a little bit of space might be good. For our friendship.” Their eyes meet, for a second, before Michonne looks away.

It hits Rick right then, that Michonne is avoiding looking at him, has been avoiding him, not because of hate or dislike, or anything of the sort, but because of the guilt. It’s baffling. It’s so shocking that Rick can only gape.

But it’s clear as day, the guilt washing over Michonne’s face like waves, and the ocean hits the tip of Rick’s toes, knocks down all his sandcastles of insecurity he has been building for the past three months. It doesn’t really make sense to him—why would Michonne feel guilty, anyway?

She hasn’t done anything wrong, not really. It’s Rick’s fault, and they both know it. He has been always been too quick to fall in love, always too hopeful about the future, never seeing the signs, never taking the signal. The optimist, he has always been. A glass half full kind of guy even when there is no glass on the table, or no glass at all, there is nothing there—

Rick guesses it must be something on his face, something in his eyes. Years worth of sadness. Kicked puppy, is the words to describe it. Rick always looks so sad—he knows, because every time he looks in the mirror, it disgusts him.

How his eyes always seem so teary and so blue, how his shoulders are always slumped, how his lips are always turned down, how his voice is always quieter than he wants it to be, how he even cries when he laughs, how he can never look happy without looking like plastic.

It’s something about him, always, that makes people take pity on him. Buy him coffee, so he will stop looking like his dog died; forgive him just this once, because they are afraid he will kill himself if they desert him for too long; date him, just because they are afraid he has nobody else to love him.

He always manipulates people around him, with a look, with a frown, just by standing there, and it’s sick, and it’s disgusting, and Rick doesn’t know how to stop doing it, when he doesn’t know how to stop looking like this all the time, when this is all he has ever been.

Forcing smiles don’t work, either. People can always tell, no matter how much of a good actor he is. People always see the emptiness behind his eyes, the tension in his jaw.

“No,” Rick says, then, “I’m sorry.”

Michonne looks up sharply, her gaze ever so blunt on Rick, like it’s supposed to be, because god, if even Michonne can’t look at him directly, not from the corner of her eyes, then who else will?

“What do you mean?”

Rick doesn’t know how to reply to that. He hoped that Michonne wouldn’t make him say it out loud, that they could just forget about it, that they could just go back—but he guesses, Michonne deserves a solid apology, before Rick can ever hope to go forward.

He is the one looking away this time. He feels his whole face go hot and he can guess he is getting redder by the minute. Lavender blood is running through his veins, shame making everything burn, like his face is.

“The stuff I said… It was stupid and I was way out of line. I’m sorry about… God, it was so stupid—I knew you were going to say no, I just… I don’t know what I was thinking, really. I was just—there is no excuse for it. I’m sorry, Michonne.”

It’s hard not to put his hands on his face, hide it from Michonne’s ever so knowing gaze, hide his blush and his shame, hide his teary eyes with the everlasting sadness in them, but on the one hand, he wants Michonne to see how genuine he is being.

This past three weeks, he has had a lot of time to think. A lot of time, for everything.

“God, Rick,” Michonne says, with pain. It starts feeling a lot more like a break-up, then. Or a funeral. Maybe Rick’s dog did die, by the way this conversation is going. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I’ve been avoiding you this whole time because I don’t want to hurt you—I don’t want to…”

Michonne stops, for a few seconds, thinking about what she wants to say, and it’s a little relief, that Rick is not the only one feeling tongue-tied, stumbling over his words and wiping his sweaty palms on his jeans, like a schoolboy about to confess his crush.

“Our friendship means so much to me, and I didn’t want to ruin it. Damage it. I’m not good with words, or emotions, and I didn’t know what to say or what to do. Then Negan told me about—you saw us, at the club, and then I didn’t know how to face you. I’m the one who needs to apologize, Rick.”

“Oh,” Rick breathes out, takes a sip of his cold latte, all the while Michonne is watching.

Silence, for a few seconds, before, “This isn’t awkward at all.”

And Michonne laughs, loud, uncontained, and Rick laughs too, with relief and shame, and they avoid acknowledging his tears.

It’s apologies, after that, explaining, more apologies, and it doesn’t make it okay and it doesn’t take anything back, but Rick feels lighter. 

The sun is setting, when they leave the café. Golden hour, Michonne says, when the sun is the perfect color, and the sky is a mix of red, pink, orange, yellow, blue, and so many more colors, dancing off Michonne’s eyes, and shining through her dark hair, and Rick is light on his feet, ready to pass out.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im starting school again tomorrow... if you want to paypal me a few dollars so i can hire a sniper to take me the fuck out i would be forever grateful!! :D
> 
> also i added the Slow Updates tag bc uhhh,, i dont trust myself. so if this fic doesnt get updated for like,,, a month,,, it probably isnt abandoned im just lazy. oof

The next time Rick sees Negan, he is a lot less bitter, a lot more understanding, and it makes it easier not to punch Negan when the guy greets him with a smug smirk, like he won something, and Rick lost. It makes it easier, but not particularly easy.

After Michonne and he talked, Rick learned that what Michonne and Negan have is a purely sexual relationship, because Michonne is not romantically interested in men.

It seems funny to Rick, that Michonne chose Negan for a relationship, no matter the subject of it, and when he jokes about it, Michonne laughs, but with an amused shake of her head that promises Rick something deeper about Negan.

Like the guy is a whole ocean, with treasure buried deep. But now, it feels like he has to swim for miles and miles before he makes it to the bottom, and then, it seems to him, if he arrives there, he might not have enough breath to swim up.

Trying to get to know Negan better, proves to be useless. Negan has a way of deflecting every question, and turning everything into an insult packed with vulgar words, or mocking -because it is way too mean to be just teasing- through everything he says.

Rick tries not to give up, or not to give in and punch Negan, or snap, but it’s ridiculously hard not to. “Do you ever take anything seriously?” He bites out through gritted teeth, like a feral dog, not able to hold the anger back anymore.

Negan, looks surprised for a second. Then he laughs loudly, body bending backward. He even does the whole hands on belly thing. Like what Rick just said is the funniest thing he has ever heard.

Rick is so close, so close to walking out, he has no idea what he hasn’t done it yet. He waits it out. He waits until Negan’s laughter dies down, and the man wipes away invisible tears from the corner of his eyes, fans his face.

Then Negan steps closer to him, so close that his breath hits Rick’s face, makes him grimace. If Negan was any closer, their noses would bump, and Rick is already going crossed eyed trying to make eye contact.

Negan, is amused. He is supporting that smug smirk again; the one Rick is getting familiar with. There is some kind of sick glint in his eyes, like he gets off on Rick’s anger, and all of it rubs Rick the wrong way, makes his teeth ache from how much he is clenching his jaw.

“I take taking out my perfectly-average-sized wiener and fucking orgasms into your girl Michonne until she is ordering a t-shirt from the Negan’s cock fan club very seriously, Rick,” Negan breathes out, a stage-whisper, almost a secret between them, almost a scream even through the loud music in the room.

Inside Rick’s ears, blood is pumping, Negan’s voice echoes of the barren walls of his rapidly slipping away logic. Negan doesn’t stop there. Of course he doesn’t. He has to push, and push, until comes the pull.

Rick’s hands turn into balls of fists, soft meat turning to hard steel. “But, that’s what this is fucking about, isn’t it? You are fucking jealous because you wanted to put your limp dick in her tight, _tight_ cunt—”

There is more there, Negan plans to keep going, Rick can tell, but it all gets choked up by the yelp that leaves Negan’s throat when Rick pulls him in with a tight grip on his stupid t-shirt, before pushing him so harshly that the man stumbles hard, almost falling on the way before his back makes contact with the wall with a thud.

The music has disappeared a long while ago, for Rick, the only sound being the beat of his heart, and the disgusting words spilling out of Negan’s mouth, but he is aware that someone has actually turned the music down as he doesn’t stop, but moves until he is right in front of Negan, taking a tight grip of the man’s t-shirt again.

There is a crowd around them, then, watching and pointing, because this is it, the world revolves around this fight, and the next one that will come after that. There is always a fight to watch, a kid to mock, a pathetic mess to point at. In that moment, Negan and him, are all of that.

“Don’t talk about her like that,” and until Rick spoke, he didn’t know his voice could go that low, that threatening.

Rick remembers, back in high-school, he used to get into fight a lot. His parents couldn’t understand why their golden boy, in the baseball team, straight A’s, loved by all teachers, a sweetheart to everyone around him, would come home with bruises coloring his body.

They never understood, actually. They still don’t.

The truth is, people didn’t mess with Rick. There was Shane, and nobody dared to mess with Shane, and wherever Shane went, Rick was there. People learned, with time, that Rick was Shane’s friend, and untouchable in the same way.

People didn’t learn, though, no matter how much time passed, that you didn’t mess with Jeff either. It was a stupid secret, between the two of them. Rick never told his parents about Jeff getting bullied, Jeff never told them about Rick’s panic attacks. It was a deal, a stupid one thought out by two embarrassed teenage boys.

Rick couldn’t swallow that mighty pill that he was having fucking panic attacks every morning, that he puked before every practice, after every game, like it was a war he fought and only barely came out alive of.

Jeff couldn’t admit that no matter how strong he was, no matter how many moves Rick taught him, he always froze up in confrontation.

So, Rick always fought his battles for him. A teenage boy shouldn’t have been forced to fight his battles anyway. Rick would go, take on the group of boys that thought they were bigger than the universe, he would get the shit kicked out of him, but he would kick the shit out of them in turn, and it was a maze they entered, where there was no exit, and no stopping, and it always went like that, a loop they were stuck in.

Until Rick moved away for college.

Back then, Rick was a lot angrier, a lot of things he repressed making him bitter over the years, a big ball of negative energy. He wasn’t one for talking. So, he had never heard his voice get this cold before.

But now, he is glad he never talked and chose to communicate with his fists, because four years of high school, getting into fights, if all of that taught him anything, it is to punch where it hurts. And Rick knows all the places that hurt.

Negan, though muscular, now under his hands, looking at him with shock on his face, is a city boy. He is such a stereotypical bad boy with his cigarettes and heavy cologne and leather jacket, but in that moment, Rick feels taller than he is, and he knows, once, not if, _once_ this turns into a fight, he will win, because if Negan has been in ten fights in his whole life, Rick fought every day of his life for four years.

People gather around them, and only then, Negan acts, as if he was waiting for an audience. “Jesus, Ricky,” the man whispers, shaking his head with an impressed whisper. “You have a lot of pent-up energy, don’t you?”

Rick scoffs, disgusted. With himself and Negan. He should be better than this, better than to fall to Negan’s level. He is letting go off of the man’s t-shirt, realizing just how stupid he was to even give Negan what he obviously wanted, a fight, when the man speaks again, his words making Rick freeze.

“If you’re gonna hit me, nothing below the waist. Michonne fucking _loves_ my dick.”

Then, it’s all limbs and grunts. Rick punches Negan, Negan punches him, somebody kicks someone, there is some biting involved, but Rick is fuzzy on the details. All he knows is pain, and satisfaction, and in the midst of all of it, when he is on top of Negan with his hands wrapped around the man’s neck, Negan’s nails clawing at his skin, he remembers thinking, _this is me_.

He is this. He was meant for it, ever since high-school.

This, is his missing piece.

It’s quite the realization, one that hits him full force and knocks the breath out of him, enough for Negan to knock him off himself, change the position so he is the one on top, he is the one with his hands wrapped around Rick’s throat.

Rick welcomes the change, welcomes the rush of adrenalin and the lack of air. There is the taste of copper in his mouth, black spots around the edge of his vision, and Rick welcomes the familiarity like an old lover, he embraces it.

The crowd is cheering around them, and Rick has found his calling in the skin underneath Negan’s cheek, where Rick clawed and now it’s bleeding, tiny drops, dropping on Rick’s face, tainting him, tainting the memory.

He doesn’t know how long they fight like that, body on body, limb against limb, steel against soft meat and then flesh against skin, before people pull Negan off him.

In the clearness of air rushing into his lungs, delicious oxygen that makes his head spin and his chest burn, Rick can hear Negan laughing. From teary eyes, he sees the man’s face, though blurry, Negan’s teeth are red.

“What the fuck, Negan?” Michonne is screaming, and people chant, all around them, they are looking for blood, in the same way Rick is.

“It was your psycho friend who fucking hit me!” Negan tries to explain, but Michonne is too busy pulling Rick up to his feet to listen.

Rick’s whole-body aches, and he likes the pain, likes the change it brings. He has been out of it for too long now, has been sleeping too comfortably in his bed, no sides to avoid laying on because it hurts to breathe.

In the end, Michonne leaves with him, they take Negan’s car, go back to her place, and she patches him up. They don’t speak.

Rick thinks it might be because she is mad at him, but she left Negan behind, with no ride, and she is here patching him up instead of Negan, so maybe, the silence is because Michonne knows where Rick comes from, who Rick is. She knows what he did, what he is doing.

Maybe, that’s why she seems so concerned, even when all the blood is cleared, and nothing needs stitching.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im sure only two people are reading this but thats fineee. this ones for u folks!! thank you for commenting and stuff (':

It seems to Rick, now that he knows Negan, the man is everywhere. Now, logically thinking, he knows Negan was probably around before too, but now that he knows the guy, he is noticing. But, it is hard to be logical when he feels so… stalked.

Everywhere he goes, he feels as if Negan is watching him. It is a reasonable fear too, because on campus, at his favorite café, the bus home—Negan is everywhere.

Rick wouldn’t care so much, if he didn’t know that Negan has a car. What is the guy doing on the bus? Rick is concerned, and angry, and everything. He is close to blowing up with another fight.

He knows that is not smart at all because after his fight with Negan, Michonne started hanging out more with that bastard. Every party she went, he was there. Every time they met up with friends, Negan was her plus one.

Rick wasn’t the only one uncomfortable with that. Maggie did not like Negan at all, and she voiced her opinion bluntly. Negan had just laughed, loud. Michonne was the one who got upset, defending Negan, which made everyone shut up, including Negan.

(Rick couldn’t get the image of Negan blushing with eyes trained forcibly on the ground like a friend defending him was the most awkward thing ever out of his mind for a few days, at least.)

Now, Rick is more careful around Negan. He doesn’t know what changed, after the fight, but he can tell Michonne actually cares about the guy.

It is proven to him one day, when he goes to Michonne’s because Glenn is having Maggie over. He should have called first, he knows. He is so stupid, just knocking on her door without a notice.

It’s his fault, that Negan answers the door, with a legendary bedhead and sleeping clothes. It’s his fault that his heart first drops to his stomach, then the floor, and it’s his fault that he drops with it.

It’s is a painful image, the one that Negan paints, with his normally slicked back hair ruffled up in all places, his coffee-stained t-shirt, and his pink boxers. The only thing that isn’t out of the ordinary is the smug smirk that adores Negan’s lips once the man realizes Rick has been gaping at him for a few seconds.

Rick closes his mouth with an audible click. His mouth is dry, like a desert, and his mind is even drier.

Suddenly, Michonne is standing beside Negan with her wallet in hand, looking almost as ruffled as Negan. Rick feels his whole face heat up, with what he doesn’t know, and he turns his blurry gaze away from the door to avoid looking at Michonne’s scantily clad form.

She rocks Negan’s t-shirt, and it suits her like a dress, falling just above her knees. Rick hadn’t noticed how big Negan is next to Michonne until then. Maybe that’s what Michonne likes. Big men who could bend her in half and drink her through a straw. Big men who flirt and make dirty jokes.

Rick has always been small, both inside and out. He feels smaller then.

“Rick,” Michonne breathes out, surprised. Then, she smiles, which is unexpected. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

Rick can gather that on his own. He wishes he wasn’t born at all, so he wouldn’t have to exist in that moment. But that’s not possible, so he puts his hands inside his pockets, shrugs while trying to make it look organic. It feels plastic. “Yeah, sorry. I should have… called.”

His eyes are still burning. His face too. His whole body is on fire, a fire Negan set with his gaze, a fire Michonne fed with her smile.

“Nonsense!” And why is Michonne so cheery about this? Rick feels anything but. He feels nothing but. Shame. “We just ordered pizza, why don’t you come in?”

And then it’s Negan’s head snapping towards Michonne, his eyebrows going up and his smirk falling. The man looks annoyed. Rick almost accepts Michonne’s offer just to make Negan mad. But he can’t.

“No, no. I wouldn’t want to intrude,” He ruffles his hair, curses himself internally because he spent so long on it just trying to make it look something other than a bird’s nest, and now his curls are everywhere, falling on his forehead and in front of his eyes, making him look like a child. “I should… go.”

“Yeah,” Negan says, at the same time Michonne says, “What? No!”

“Come in, Rick,” Michonne says, after sending Negan a look that makes the man smirk even wider, but he moves out of the way for Rick to pass.

Rick battles with himself for a few seconds, standing there like an idiot while everyone waits for him to make a decision, and in the end, he shrugs and walks in. It’s petty, it’s so petty and childish and sick and it makes him blush but Rick thinks, the longer I spend here, the less sex they will have.

He is a sick, sick man.

“Behave, Negan,” he hears Michonne whisper behind him, and it makes him feel even more out of place, like he doesn’t fit inside Michonne’s house, and he doesn’t even fit inside his skin. There are ants crawling on his arms, and he scratches, harshly, pulls down the sleeve of his sweater to cover the white, red, angry nail marks he is creating.

“I’ll be on my best fucking behavior,” Negan replies, louder than a whisper but with a voice low. “You know I fucking love threesomes.”

Michonne doesn’t bother replying, Rick doesn’t bother acknowledging. He isn’t going to play Negan’s game this time, he isn’t going to sink to the man’s level. It’s not easy, being strong without using his fists, but he promises himself he won’t give in.

“We are watching Netflix, if that’s cool with you,” Michonne says as they sit down. Negan is left standing. Rick almost sits on the sofa, next to Michonne, but he knows he doesn’t belong there.

There are blankets and pillows on the sofa, for Negan and Michonne. Where Rick belongs is the armchair, the one that makes his back ache, the one that is lumpy enough to press on his ass uncomfortably.

“You want anything to drink, Ricky?” Negan asks, because of course he does, because of course he is comfortable enough in Michonne’s a house to—

Rick freezes, feeling as if ice cold water has been dumped over his head, or his whole body has been dumped into the water, and he is still under it, the ice is making his limbs freeze, he can’t move, and water is filling his lungs, he can’t breathe—

“No, thank you.”

Rick misses a piece of conversation, then. He is still battling for control. Trying hard not to lose it.

So, what if Negan moved in with Michonne? It’s none of Rick’s business. But what about Andrea? She doesn’t like Negan, right? How does she feel about this? Michonne wouldn’t just say ‘fuck it’ and offer Negan to move in anyway, right?

What if Andrea moved out? What if Negan and Michonne are living together, alone? Like a proper couple.

How long has Michonne known Negan anyway? It can’t be for too long. A month, at most. That’s too early for big decisions like this.

Rick isn’t aware he has been biting down on his bottom lip until his teeth pull on chapped skin and he tastes blood. It’s familiar, it’s everything he needs. A wake-up call. He stops biting, looks around the room to see that Michonne is trying to find a good movie, and Negan is nowhere to be seen.

“Um,” Rick starts, partly because he has things to say—god, so many things to say, and so many things to yell, scream—and partly to fill the silence. “So, you and Negan, huh?”

It’s nothing casual, like Rick wants it to be. He sounds forced and fake and out of breath and everything he is but doesn’t want to be.

“What?” Michonne asks, but she doesn’t sound offended or angry. She just sounds confused. Michonne doesn’t make him say it, thank god. She understands what Rick meant after a second. “Oh! No. He is just crashing here for a few days. His flat mates kicked him out.”

“They didn’t fucking kick me out,” Negan says, then, coming out of Michonne’s room. He is wearing sweatpants now, and Rick can bet his right arm that Michonne asked him to. “I left.”

The man sounds almost offended as he sits next to Michonne, getting under the blankets, getting comfortable, _right next to Michonne_ , where he belongs, where Rick has no business wanting to be in.

“Of course not,” Michonne says with a smile, almost as if she is humoring a child. Then she rests her head on Negan’s chest, cuddling to him, like couples do. It’s the weirdest thing Rick has ever seen, maybe. The most painful, maybe.

He looks away, but then, _but then_ Negan smirks. That smug smirk that looks nothing like his cute pout a second ago, nothing like a smile. It just looks mean and Rick freezes.

Then, Negan winks.

Rick feels sick. He is being paranoid, of course he is, but it would be the perfect excuse—it would be perfect, to say he got kicked out, that he needs a place to stay, and Michonne wouldn’t turn him away, of course she wouldn’t, and then a few days would turn to a week, a week to a month, and soon enough Michonne would be used to having him there, she would like it, she wouldn’t want him to leave, after that.

“What happened?” Rick asks, trying to sound curious, but it just falls flat, his voice completely void of any emotion. Michonne notices, sends him a questioning look, but he doesn’t look at her, doesn’t turn his gaze away from Negan even for a second.

He feels frozen, in time, in space, inside Negan’s heavy gaze.

“They won’t stop fucking like rabbits, everywhere, all the time, and I snapped after I caught them on the fucking kitchen counter. We had a fight,” Negan explains, rolling his eyes in annoyance at the ‘memory’.

Rick forces himself to nod, tries to look sympathetic. “You are flatmates with Arat and Laura, right?”

Negan nods, opens his mouth to say something, but then the doorbell rings. “Negan,” Michonne says, her voice pleading.

Negan groans. “I’m too fucking comfortable, and me getting up would mean you losing your fucking pillow.”

The doorbell rings a second time, and then Rick has two pairs of puppy eyes on him. “I’ve got it,” he says, getting up with a sigh.

“My wallet is there,” Negan says, pointing at the table, but Rick waves a hand.

“It’s okay, I’ve got it.”

That day, Rick pays for, _and_ serves pizza to the woman he loves and her partner. It’s okay, really. He has never been one to mind, anything at all.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oopsies i hate this

Rick is at a house party again, when it happens. Looking back, he doesn’t know why he was there in the first place. He doesn’t like parties. He never did. All he wants is to lay down in his bed and never ever get up again, and he doesn’t even like that.

So, he goes to parties, because it’s the thing to do.

He finds that without drinking, parties are insufferable. That’s why he drinks, and when Rick drinks, he drinks fast, hard, and he doesn’t stop until the whole world is spinning, and someone pulls the ground from underneath him.

He doesn’t really know how it happens. One second, he is talking to Michonne, the next he really, really needs to pee. Cheap beer always makes his bladder full.

It’s stupid—so stupid, but Rick doesn’t really pay attention to his drink at all. He doesn’t remember leaving it unattended, or even putting it down, but he doesn’t remember much anyway. He just knows he wasn’t as careful as he could have been.

When he gets back, it’s with even a fuzzier mind and a twisting stomach. It ties itself in knots and knots, until Rick has to press a hand down on his tummy to feel some sort of comfort.

To fight nausea, Rick down his drink in one gulp. Of course he does.

Soon enough his world is spinning even faster. Rick knows—he is supposed to know—he read about the signs and the signs are all there—but he never cared, did he? He never thought this was possible. That’s why he is foolish even in that moment, doesn’t realize or care about what the fuck is going on.

But then, as he is dancing, or standing, or maybe doing nothing at all, he feels his eyelids start dropping. He is so, so tired, that it must be impossible he is still awake. He feels like he is floating, and if he weren’t so dizzy, he would probably check his feet to see if they are still on solid ground.

There is nothing holding his body up, his head up, except thin air. Rick, is flying.

He doesn’t know why he goes to the backyard. Maybe because it’s the closest place, and maybe because Rick knows it will be empty.

Maybe, staying where people can see him would be safer, but Rick remembers thinking, one of his clear thoughts, that if someone was to grab him—because that’s how it happens, right? The person pretends they are just helping out the drunk person, walking them home—they would have a harder time finding him in the backyard.

Maybe they would never even check there.

It seems foolish to him now, but apparently, it makes sense to his past self, because he goes out to the backyard, barely makes it there, and then he doesn’t remember anything at all.

He wakes up in a strange bed.

His first thought is to panic, but he doesn’t even have the energy to lift up his finger, even blinking is hard. And when he opens his eyes, he realizes how much his stomach is churning, like he will throw up if he opens his mouth.

Taking a deep breath is hard. But Rick forces himself to. He also forces himself to calm down.

Trying to lift his head up, he quickly checks the room to see if anyone is there with him. It’s a small relief.

A reasonable person would maybe check for their phone—and Rick can even see his on the nightstand! —they would probably call someone, do something, but the first thing Rick does is look down on himself.

He isn’t wearing his own clothes.

Then, it’s too much. It’s too much and there are tears in Rick’s eyes already. A pitiful whine leaves his throat, and it’s too loud in the silent room that Rick throws a hand over his mouth in horror.

It’s such a miracle that he hasn’t thrown up yet, but it doesn’t comfort him at all. He doesn’t why—he doesn’t understand what the fuck is going on—fuck—

The sweatpants belong to a male, probably, because they are too big on Rick, hanging off his feet. He can smell the perfume on the t-shirt he is wearing, and the smell, it’s familiar in a way that makes him sick—he can’t really place a finger on it, but the idea that the person who did this might be someone he knows—

A sob he doesn’t manage to muffle echoes in the room, and Rick makes an alarmed sound, stilling completely. Outside the room, there are footsteps coming nearer.

Rick moves on the bed with another pitiful whine, both hands on his mouth now. He is aware he is hyperventilating, and he can’t even see from the blurriness of his tears, but it’s just too much—so much, and Rick has never been able to handle things, at all.

The door opens slowly, and a man pokes his head inside. It takes at least a few seconds for Rick’s eyes to focus. He recognizes the figure as Negan.

His hands fall from his face n shock, and even his panic comes to a stop for a second. He wonders what kind of a picture he paints, sitting on the bed with his knees tucked to his chest, wailing like a baby, and suddenly Rick is angry.

“Wha—what the fuck?” He manages to spit out, tries to make it sound mad, but his voice is wavering uncontrollably, and it just ends up sounding scared, terrified.

“Shit, Ricky, calm down for a sec,” Negan says, and Negan is entirely too calm about all of this, everything going on, and then the man takes a step forward.

Rick is crawling back on the bed instantly, feeling his breath stutter as he chokes on a breath. “Don’t you—fucking dare. Stay there!” Negan freezes, but it doesn’t calm Rick at all. “Calm down,” he repeats with a sick laugh, because how can Negan except him to calm down, how can—

Then, Rick repeats it again, this time closing his eyes and clutching his hair painfully. “Calm down,” he tells himself sternly. “Calmdowncalmdowncalmdown—”

“Rick?”

Looking up sharply, Rick sees Michonne from behind his tears. “Fuck,” he says, and then leaning towards the side, he throws up.

After that, it’s all soft encouragements and Michonne helping him to the toilet, brushing his sweaty curls back from his forehead, helping him stand up because Rick’s knees keep buckling, helping him wash his fucking hands because Rick is too shaky to do it—

Negan is nowhere to be found.

Michonne is the one to explain to Rick that David roofied him as a prank. Then, they noticed his absence. He wasn’t answering his phone. People got concerned.

It’s really embarrassing to think about, for some reason. Rick even feels his whole face go hot with burning, churning shame. It’s sick and it’s disgusting, and he has no idea how something like this happened to him—but nothing happened to him, did it? Not really. Nobody did anything, he was just knocked out for a day and that’s it—all that trouble, for all of this nothing, for such a lack of something—god we were so concerned, Michonne says, I called everyone, Michonne says, we looked everywhere, Michonne says, I almost called the cops—

(I was the one who changed your clothes, Michonne says, made sure you were okay, Michonne says. Nothing happened, Michonne stresses, and Rick has never felt more like a burden, he has never felt so heavy before in his life.)

Negan was the one who found him, passed out on the backyard. It was dark out, so nobody saw him, and they didn’t even think to check the backyard more carefully than a small sweep with their eyes. Negan, tripped over Rick’s passed out body, apparently. He had been missing for over three hours.

It is surprising to Rick, that Negan actually helped look for him. But then, Michonne says that Negan was the one to insist on looking through the house a third time, and how they almost didn’t listen—and it gets Rick thinking.

It’s surprising, how Negan helped look for Rick, how he knew exactly where to find him.

Rick remembers, a fuzzy memory in his brain that he can only then can make sense of: It’s Negan, but he is younger back then -freshman year, maybe? - he doesn’t have his beard, Rick doesn’t think he can even grow one, yet. Right beside him, is David. Rick knows David. He doesn’t know Negan. It’s his first ever time seeing the dark-haired man, and Rick remembers, thinking as clearly as someone could under the harsh lights and the bodies grinding against him inside the small room, with alcohol running through his veins, that this stranger with the sharp face and loud laugh, is something that is to be painted.

It’s curious, how the human brain works. Rick had no collection of that memory until now. But now, is what matters, because back then, he had seen a pretty face and a shameless laugh, and he had been mesmerized, but now, he remembers, the arm Negan had thrown over David’s shoulder, the joke that made Negan laugh in that careless way in the first place—it’s all such small details, that he shouldn’t be able to remember, but he is glad he does, because they are all that matters, now, because the deed has been done and Rick can clutch is the tiny hopelessness he feels deep inside his chest, even though nothing happened, all he has left with is this mind-numbing feeling of betrayal he tastes in the back of his throat.

He blinks the tears out of his eyes, hides the subtle shaking of his hands by making them tight fists. “Negan and David. They are friends, right?” There is a slur to his words, like he is drunk, or high, or getting there, and maybe Rick is all of those things, in that moment. He feels anything but sober.

Then, it’s Michonne blinking, and she doesn’t look away as she speaks. “They used to be.”

So, it’s not a secret. Somehow, Rick still feels like if he hadn’t discovered—remembered the truth on his own, nobody would have told him. He doesn’t know why—he has no idea—he doesn’t understand, anything at all.

Especially why Michonne would cover for Negan, cover up something like that, something that bile rising, something that mind churning, but then it makes sense to him with the echo of two words: Nothing happened.

There is nothing under the ground Michonne is trying to cover up with dirt, no secrets, no pain, no crimes, no sin. Only except Rick’s grave, maybe.

Rick remembers living with his parents, Rick remembers Lori -sweet Lori, whose betrayal hurt so bad-, Rick remembers Shane. He doesn’t remember any of it hurting this bad.

“I think I want to be alone now,” Rick says, smaller than he means to, so it ends up coming out sad and pathetic, like something horrifying has happened, when nothing has happened at all.

Michonne sighs. Negan’s room has grey walls, covered with posters of various bands. It’s messy, with clothes thrown everywhere, Rick can’t see the floor. The bedsheets are silk, crimson, and they smell like Negan, Rick notices now that he isn’t out of his mind with panic.

Negan’s room has grey walls and it feels so incredibly small to Rick that he feels like suffocating. The smell surrounding him is nice, makes him want to his nose into the pillow or the soft fabric of his t-shirt to get more of it, but he is too aware that it’s Negan’s scent, and he never wanted to know what Negan smelled like—leather, cigarettes, something soft, like vanilla, but sharper—

“I want to go home,” he says, because it’s still too much, and it’s never enough, “Then I want to be alone.”

“Rick,” Michonne starts, soft, small, and Rick feels so big next to it that he doesn’t fit inside the room.

“Please,” Rick says before Michonne can continue, and it’s the first sharp word to come from him that day, despite its nature. Then, to soften the blow. “I’m still tired.”

Michonne sighs, again, so exhausted and worn out, that Rick notices with his blurry gaze, the bags under her eyes, the way her hair stick to her forehead with sweat, her chapped lips. He doesn’t understand why Michonne looks so concerned to let him go. If he was in her shoes, he would have kicked himself out already.

Negan is the one to drive him home, because nobody else has a car. Before they leave, Arat nods at him with something in her eyes, that feels close to pity, looks a bit too much like sorrow, that Rick feels sick again, fastens his steps.

On the road home, it is silent except for Negan’s music. Rick is too tired to speak, he wasn’t lying about his exhaustion. They stop two times, on the way, because the bumps of the ride make Rick almost throw up. His eyes and throat burn, both from nausea and something much deeper than that.

He excepts Negan to be annoyed with him, but the guy doesn’t say anything, which makes Rick so angry—enraged. Negan would be saying something, making fun of him in some way, if things were normal and Rick can’t understand why they aren’t. Nothing happened, after all.

The only conversation they have is when Negan says, “It’s normal that you feel sick, fucker probably used homemade pills. It should pass in a couple of days, max.”

Then, it’s Rick replying, “You know a lot about this.”

Then, it’s Negan pressing his lips in a thin white line, tightening his grip on the steering wheel until his fingers are as a white. His knuckles are bloody. There is still a faint bruise on his cheekbone that Rick gave him, and Rick feels some kind of sick satisfaction.

When they stop in front of his apartment, Rick wonders if Glenn is home. He doesn’t really want to go inside. He just wants to stay in the car forever, despite the bile rising in his throat after every bump, despite Negan sitting beside him.

There is a small comfort, in car rides, where you don’t have to exist. You can just stare out of the window and watch the streets pass in a blur, watch as the day turns to night, watch as the sun dies and a new moon is born, and you don’t have to feel guilty about it. Nobody expects you to study or work or do your taxes, when you are in a car ride. Nobody expects you to exist.

Rick thinks he could ride with Negan forever, in that moment. Because not existing is exactly what he needs.

That’s not possible, of course, he knows. Still, he can’t get himself to open the door. Something is stirring inside his mouth, his tongue pressing at the back of his teeth with anticipation. He is aware Negan is looking at him curiously, waiting for him to get the fuck off his car—

“Did you know?”

His words break through the comfortable silence almost turning awkward like an arrow, or something stronger, because arrows break but Rick’s words, in that moment, have some kind of holy strength in them, one that even God himself couldn’t compete with.

“What?” Negan asks, even though he knows exactly what Rick means, and they both know it. He is stalling for time. Rick doesn’t know, though, if it’s because he is trying to think of a lie, or if he is too ashamed of the truth to just say it.

Then, it’s Negan’s hand, with their bloody knuckles, letting go off the steering wheel, ruffling his carefully slicked-back hair. Rick doesn’t turn his gaze away even once.

“No,” Negan finally answers, blue on brown, and blue on green, and Negan’s eyes are not a color that can be described, with the soft light in the car making the man’s face look softer than it is, all the sharp edges locked away for the time being, and Rick doesn’t know what it is but he thinks this might be the first time Negan has even been honest with him.

It makes him feel, a lot, but he doesn’t know what he is feeling, all his emotions running high, his body too exhausted to deal with any of it.

Faced with Rick’s silence, Negan continues speaking to fill the emptiness that clings to the air, or the lack of it, because it is suffocating, in that small car. “I was asking around if anybody saw you and that’s when Davey told me what he fucking did—sick motherfucker. He thought it would just a harmless funny little prank.”

Rick knows that’s not what Negan is doing but he feels like the man is defending David—Davey, as he calls him—and all of it makes him so… so angry, or something like it, but softer, with less sharp edges and more shadows, like Negan’s face in that moment.

With a flinch he barely suppresses, Rick realizes it is betrayal he is feeling. It’s laughable and pathetic, because Rick hadn’t realized that he trusted Negan -Negan!- until the guy let him down, or pushed him over the edge, then spat on him, then ran him over with his car, then—

All of this, makes Rick look away. “So, you didn’t know before it happened?” He asks, without looking anywhere, without seeing anything, so blind that it’s almost like he closed his eyes, but they are so wide open with fear that Rick doesn’t think he will ever be able to even blink again.

“Rick,” Negan says, gruff and low, and he sounds like Michonne, for some reason. “I know you think I hate your fucking guts or something but I fucking don’t, and even if I did, I would never do or allow something like this,” But nothing happened, Rick thinks, and almost giggles hysterically, “I didn’t fucking know. I swear.”

Then, it’s Rick lifting his gaze from nothing and taking everything in, everything is Negan, in that tiny car, because nothing else exists. “You don’t hate me?” He asks, and it’s the wrong question to ask because Rick doesn’t really want to know the answer, he doesn’t care.

It doesn’t matter, after all, if Negan fantasizes about murdering him brutally at night, or if he is head over heels in love with him.

Negan looks at him carefully, then, and when he speaks, it’s almost a whisper. “No.”

It worries Rick, because what kind of thing could make Negan this honest, with all his being, and this soft, like he is wearing all his sins out on his wrists—Negan should be smirking here, lopsided, taunting Rick, cruel and mean, Negan should be anything but this—something horrible must have happened, Rick thinks, in confusion, because—because nothing happened, anywhere in the world. Time froze everywhere, as Rick slept, while the world stopped spinning and waited for him.

“I hate you,” Rick says, and he does, with all his being.

A second, two, three, and then it’s Negan laughing, sudden, unapologetic, like what Rick said is the funniest thing ever. Laughing suits Negan, in a way it shouldn’t. Maybe it’s just the momentary anger, but Rick thinks it isn’t fair, that Negan gets to laugh and look good while doing it, it’s not fair, and Negan should never laugh again, god should never give him the chance—

Rick gets out, without saying anything, after that. Just as he is about to close the door, Negan calls for him. With a sigh, Rick ducks, so he can make eye contact with Negan, one hand still on the door, ready to slam it shut any minute.

“Listen, Ricky, you don’t have to fucking worry about little Davey. He is too much of a fucking moron to mess with you again. He was just trying to make a fucking prank—”

“And that makes it okay?” Rick spits out then, actually spits, because he feels like an animal, but not the strong, predator kind. Rick is the prey, he is a small cat puffing up his fur and showing teeth with the small hope of intimidating.

“No,” Negan stresses, then, with a sigh. “Whatever. All I’m saying is he won’t fucking mess with you again.”

Rick doesn’t reply.

Inside his apartment, is when he finally drops the façade. He feels so disorientated, when he looks at his hands, flexes his fingers, his skin doesn’t feel like his. He feels like a stranger in his own space, has trouble recognizing his own living room.

There, he has eaten breakfast so many mornings, that sofa, where he had movie nights with Glen—and Glenn. Rick doesn’t know if the man is home. Calling out his name, once, twice, to make sure, Rick doesn’t get a reply.

Completely alone in the little flat, Rick is allowed to mourn, for what he doesn’t understand. All he knows is the strong emotions that suddenly overtake his body, then, it’s his knees buckling, and he barely holds on to the wall, slides down with his back pressed to it. A yell like sob leaves his throat, so desperate and in pain that one would think he is being murdered. Quickly, Rick presses a hand against his throat, to muffle any other sounds that might come out, because even when completely alone, Rick doesn’t like existing other than his small bodily presence, he doesn’t like disturbing the still air.

When he thinks about air, he realizes he can’t breathe, from behind his tears, from behind his hand, and his lungs are burning with the effort, his heart is beating against his ribcage in a race, a race for him to live, but he thinks, it wouldn’t be so bad, if he died, really.

His chest shakes, bends, breaks, and he thinks -he would laugh if he could-, all this, all this for a day lost; because in the end, that’s all it is. Nothing happened. He has no bruises on his body and he checked, in Negan’s small bathroom, where there was a package of condoms in the shower.

David didn’t even touch him, probably. He just went to sleep, a small practice of death, and he just lost a few hours, a day, maybe, and now he is tired and feeling sick, but that’s all it is.

He doesn’t understand why it matters so much to him, when it really shouldn’t matter at all, when he knows, logically thinking, nothing matters at all—

Suddenly there are hands on his shoulders, a voice, in the back of his mind, drowned out by the sound of his heart pounding, blood rushing, tears flowing. “Rick?” It’s Negan.

Rick crawls away with a yelp, trying to wipe at his face to clear his gaze, so he can, and he is not hallucinating. It’s real. Blood and flesh, Negan is looking at him, and he looks concerned, such a weird emotion on that sharp face, sharper now under the artificial light of Rick’s living room.

Never would have Rick thought that if he ever saw Negan concerned, the emotion would be held for him.

“What the—what are you doing here?” He asks, trying to sound angry, but the words are choked out between sobs and gasps, and no matter how much Rick wipes at his eyes, the tears won’t stop coming. His whole-body aches and shakes with the force of his panic, his sadness, and to be seen in this pathetic state makes his eyes burn even more.

How long has he been crying? How did Negan get in? What does he want? Rick has too many questions and so little breath to ask them.

“Come on, get up,” Negan is saying, and Negan is touching, and Rick loses his balance when Negan lifts him up, and loses himself, maybe, because the next time he blinks, he is in his bed, under the covers. He is still crying, so heavy, so deep, like thunder and rain.

“Rick, Rick, look at me,” Negan is holding his face between his hands, face too close, breath fanning Rick’s wet face and making his insides curl with disgust. Rick pulls away from the touch, not as sharply, or strong as he would have liked. “You have to stop hyperventilating or you’re gonna fucking pass out—”

“Don’t touch me,” Rick snarls, kitty cat, small deer, scared zebra—he paws at Negan’s hands weakly, because he literally has no strength at all, even moving a finger harder than lifting weight at the gym.

Negan, thankfully, lets go and even takes a step back, before Rick can embarrass himself more. “What’s going on?” That’s not really the question Rick meant to ask, but Negan understands what he means.

“You forgot your fucking clothes,” Negan explains, as Rick begins to slowly calm down. Rick remembers, then. His clothes were still wet, so they put it in a bag, and Rick left wearing Negan’s sweatpants and t-shirt. The bag was on the backseat. So stupid, forgetting—“ I rang the doorbell, but you wouldn’t fucking answer.”

I was worried, goes without saying, Rick hears it at the end of Negan’s sentence, like an echo bouncing off the walls of his room. He wonders what Negan thought he would do—kill himself? He wonders if Negan broke down his door. Negan would be the type of person to do that, Rick thinks.

“I can’t stop crying,” he suddenly exclaims, with worry, because no matter how hard he tries, he can’t stop, and at this point, his chest hurts so bad that it makes him want to cry even harder.

“It’s okay, Rick. I’m gonna call Michonne—”

“No!” Rick finds the strength to say, and he even lifts his head up from the pillow to look at Negan. “Don’t call her.”

Then, he pulls the pillow from underneath his head, hugs it as tightly as he can, because it burns him, the need to hold, to be held, but this pillow is all he has. He desperately wishes Michonne was there with him, but Michonne doesn’t even have a car—and even is she did, it wouldn’t be worth all the effort, all the pain, just because Rick won’t stop crying.

“Okay, Rick, I won’t,” Negan says, and for some reason, Rick trusts him. Maybe because he is too tired to have insecurities or doubts in that moment. He has always been tired, all his life, but this is a different level, where he genuinely thinks that after he goes to sleep, he might not wake up.

And maybe it’s that tiredness, or maybe it’s that desire, or maybe it’s nothing, everything, that stops Rick from pulling away when he feels hands swiping his curls back from his forehead. When the gentle touch doesn’t stop, Rick welcomes him.

He doesn’t know how long it takes for him to finally stop crying, and then fall asleep, but the hand is always there, offering comfort that Rick didn’t know he needed until he had it.

The next morning, he wakes up with a killer headache and an upset stomach. He gulps down the water that’s on his nightstand. Tries not to remember the events of yesterday.

In the kitchen, on the table, there is a package of snack and healthy food, that will probably help with his nausea. Right next to them, his clothes. The note simply says that leaving his keys under the welcome mat is too predictable, and that the next time he is feeling emotions, he should call Michonne, because she is way better at that feelings bullshit.

Glenn is eating cereal, without milk. “Rick,” he says, seriously, once Rick stops reading, and Rick thinks here we go. This is where it comes, the pity. Drumroll, please. “I told you putting the key under the welcome mat was too predictable.”

Then, it’s them eating cereal, without milk, together.

It’s a week after all of this, when Rick sees David again. The guy looks like a kitten, a small deer, a scared zebra, when he sees Rick, and changes directions.

Rick doesn’t know what that means, but it’s a small satisfaction the world offers him, and he takes it.


End file.
